Biscuit's Big Adventure part 2 -- from Salt Lake City to Daytona Beach in a 1992 RJ77 (1 Viewer)

[John Young]

Hi all,

I've written previously about our adventure in driving from Arlington, Virginia to the Land Cruiser Heritage Museum in Salt Lake City two years ago. We've actually already picked up Biscuit and are on our way, or at least we were on our way, driving Biscuit to Florida where Biscuit will be used as a daily driver by my son in Daytona Beach. I will tell a coherent story and fill in the gaps later about the adventure so far, but at the moment poor Biscuit is laid up in Moab right outside the door of Room 101 at JR's Desert Inn on Main Street in Moab, Utah, and we could use some help...

We were sticking to Level 2 difficulty trails given that Biscuit had just been serviced and were on the way back from a lovely drive past Hurrah Pass to the East of Moab when the 22R died. Gas, check. Crank, check. Spark...nope. Looked for loose stuff nothing. I did not see it at the time but it turned that the coil had split and black lava like stuff had sagged out of it. I'd share a photo but the bandwidth in Moab makes that a challenge. We ordered and replaced the coil and the igniter and still no joy. I've ordered the pickup that goes in the distributor but it won't be here until Thursday.

My apologies, but his is kind of a plea for help if anyone knows of some friendly Mud members or can recommend a mechanic in Moab who would be old Land Cruiser friendly, I'd be very appreciative.

 

[AirheadNut]

Sorry to hear of your mechanical troubles! Hopefully you can get it sorted out without too much hassle. I'm sure there are some 'Mud members in the Moab area that could help point you in the right direction, @MoaByte and @DRANGED are the only ones that come to mind right now but perhaps they know some others too.

 

[MoaByte]

I'll be available after 2. I'd be happy to have a look.

 

[John Young]

Thank you both! MB, I have PM'd you.

 

[OGBeno]

I'll be available after 2. I'd be happy to have a look.

Nice.

 

[John Young]

I'm happy to say that the 22R is running again. But without the tach, which is kind of a pain to be without. We are going back this afternoon to put Biscuit up on the rack to look at a leak that looks like it is from the speedo cable and to top off the transfer case. We will try to get the tach fixed at the same time.

 

[WarDamnEagle]

I'm happy to say that the 22R is running again. But without the tach, which is kind of a pain to be without. We are going back this afternoon to put Biscuit up on the rack to look at a leak that looks like it is from the speedo cable and to top off the transfer case. We will try to get the tach fixed at the same time.

You don't need a tach if you have ears.

 

[MoaByte]

This is what adventure is about. Great to meet you guys, I wish we had more time. Absolutely love the 80.

 

[John Young]

This is what adventure is about. Great to meet you guys, I wish we had more time. Absolutely love the 80.

RJ77!!! Thank you for all your hospitality, MB. Jonathan and I really enjoyed visiting and seeing your various rigs!

I found myself envying your aftermarket EFI on your 60 Series.

Biscuit seems to be having a fairly significant idle stalling problem. Other than that he is running like a champ. We got some advice remotely from Carbmaster in Salt Lake which we will try in the morning. We left Maob at about 4 pm making for our room at Sevier River Ranch outside Bryce Canyon which was a bit of a stretch and we ended up driving after dark arriving at about 10:30 pm. Thankfully they have self checkin. Really nice place too!

More later...

 

[Felde]

Have a safe trip !
Looking forward to some more scenic pictures.
(Saying that after just crawling from beyond my BJ73 where I was servicing my transfer case. So I just had the same 'scenery' you guys were looking at the other day )

 

[John Young]

Ok.... I've got a little downtime here in Albuquerque, NM, while Biscuit is being looked at by Toyo Master. This is our journey so far:

Back to the beginning--

A couple of weeks ago my son and I arrived at the shop in Salt Lake that had taken on the job of rebuilding the carb and going through the truck to see what else needed attention before our long drive from Salt Lake to Daytona Beach. Here is how we first saw the truck:

View attachment 2760706

There was some wear in the valve guides and the better alternative was just to put a brand new head on the 22R. And of course a new oil pump, new timing chain, etc. I was glad to see these items done because while the motor had gotten us all the way from Virginia to Salt Lake a couple of years ago, it still was an unknown. I figured with all this and a rebuilt carb, we should be in good shape for the trip East. The cost honestly was not bad on this little 22R which was so commonly used in Toyota pickups in the 80s.

 

[John Young]

The next thing we did was visit the Land Cruiser Heritage Museum in Salt Lake, overseen by Mud's own CruiserDan. Even the trucks outside the museum are interesting:

We had a lot of fun inside.

Of particular interest was a beautifully re-built Venezuelan troopy which gave me all kinds of ideas for what to do with my troopy back in Dubai.

Every nut and bolt had been replated. I need to learn how to do that....

 

[John Young]

The detail on the Museum's troopy's interior was really, really nice.

I also saw my dream 105 except for the fact that the steering wheel is on the wrong side.

And finally, a poor old 40 that had been through the Paradise Fire in California

It had gotten so hot that the glass in the headlights had melted.

 

[John Young]

It took a couple more days before Biscuit was ready--we visited every day but tried not to be a nusinance.

One of the last things I did in Dubai was to fedex to the garage in Utah a replacement heating and control set because the garage in Salt Lake was having difficulties locating a spare. It had the right controls but no AC on-off switch. Operationally (and I had forgotten this over the past 2 years) whenever you put on the fan it also turned on the AC compressors. I'm sure that this was done in the Middle East where they had no use for the heater. The heater core was actually bypassed when I bought the truck.

We picked up Biscuit on a Friday and headed South for Moab, Utah. It was pretty warm and I was a little concerned about overheating. So shortly after departing we unhooked the AC compressor clutch under the hood so we could run the fan for more ventilation.

We reconnected the compressor from time to time for a break and after 45 minutes or so disconnect it again. But we made it to Moab without any overheating, or even really getting close to it, despite the heat and rugged terrain.

We'd never been to Moab before so we stopped in the visitor center and got some advice asking for trails of difficulty 2 or less. Biscuit had been running well with no issues so we were pretty confident, without basis unfortunately....

Our first try off road in Biscuit was to Gemini Bridge, a road that I think a regular sedan could probably do.

 

[Rigster]

Looks good John! I am sure Toyo Masters will look after you and get you on your way again... just be sure to turn the right way in Albuquerque! If you don't, say hi to Bugs for me!!

 

[John Young]

We hiked over the the bridges themselves which was a nice little walk. (We were told that people used to drive over them until an unfortunate incident.)

After spending some time we headed back taking the rest of the loop rather than going back the way we came.

It was dark when we got back to Moab and we stopped at the micro-brew for dinner. My advice--don't. All three of the beers I tried all were undrinkable IMHO. But Biscuit did get some attention out in the parking lot.

The next day, emboldened by our Gemini Bridges trip without incident we decided to try Hurrah Pass, also a difficulty '2' on the visitor centre (13 USD) map.

 

[John Young]

We had a great time, taking our time, looking at the rocks and petroglyphs.

Some truly amazing terrain.

Here is the other side of where we parked:

 

[John Young]

Some more fun, but not too challenging stuff:

And we made it to Hurrah Pass

We went down the far side a fair distance for a look see--this is an out and back trail. Really fun and not too challenging.

Then we went back over the pass and headed back to Moab. we go to within 5 miles of the paved road by the river when Biscuit up and quit.

I was not too worried because we had seen lots of traffic the whole time we were on this trail, both rented side-by-sides (a term my son taught me) and 4x4's. Dredging up lessons from Junior High auto shop in the 1970's, we opened the hood and went through and tried to figure out what was what. Fuel, check. Starter, check. Spark, ... uh oh....

Poor Biscuit's ignition had completely died. I checked for loose wires but my gut was telling me this was not something I could fix at the side of the road. The next Jeep that came by offered us a ride. Jonathan went with the Samaritan and I stayed with Biscuit.

 

[John Young]

I expected it would take a couple of hours for my son to find a 4x4 recovery and to come back, but I had lots of water and a couple of cigars so I settled in to relax, occasionally looking to see if I might have overlooked something with Biscuit. I took some photos but had no internet in this canyon.

Almost everyone stopped to ask if I needed help. One very nice couple made a big difference by leaving a beverage, ice cold no less.

Just at nightfall, Jonathan got back with a 4x4 tow truck, driver, and driver's girlfriend. Nations Towing. Can't say enough nice about them. The driver, Jase, was concerned that he might damage the bull bar on Biscuit and offered to unbolt it, which was very thoughtful.

Just to add an interesting touch... the tow truck broke down:

But eventually Biscuit was hooked up and we were able to get underway.

Jonathan rode in Biscuit and I rode in the tow truck with Jase and Jennifer (hope I got the name right) who shared with me lots of incredible photos of her mother's time living in Africa.

 

[John Young]

Jase dropped us off at our motel.

I had sent some photos to our mechanic in Salt Lake that eventually got through when I got back in range of internet cellular service.

He picked up something obvious I had missed. Namely:

The coil had, essentially, melted!

More later....